Last week, producers and cast members of the Alberta-shot AMC western Hell on Wheels went to Oklahoma City’s National Cowboy & Western Heritage Museum to pick up the show’s second consecutive “Wrangler” for best TV drama.

“We get no love from any other awards program,” says John Wirth, the series showrunner. “So we’re going to take it from the cowboys.”

It’s true, compared to AMC’s golden children — Breaking Bad, Mad Men and even The Walking Dead — the gritty tale of America’s first transcontinental railroad has received no love from the Golden Globes and scant attention from the Emmys (Gustavo Santaolalla received a nod for Outstanding Original Main Title Theme Music in 2012) over the years.

But as filming begins this week for its fifth and final season, Hell on Wheels has built and maintained a loyal following by mixing gun-blazing adventure with an exploration of the racial and gender politics of America’s frontier after the Civil War.

In Season 4, Hell on Wheels’ body count included some favourite characters. Elam Ferguson survived a bear attack, but was eventually killed off because actor Common wanted to leave the series to concentrate on his music career. Mormon orphan Ezra Dutson (played by Calgary actor Tayden Marks) and kindly preacher’s daughter Ruth (Kasha Kropinski) also met violent ends.

As is often the case with AMC, Season 5 of will be airing in two cycles. Seven new episodes will air this summer and seven will air in the summer of 2016. The location will also change. Last year, much of the show was shot on the Albertina Farms south of Calgary. This year, it will be filmed at the CL Ranch west of the city, which will be playing Laramie, Wyoming and Truckie, California.

Wirth talked with the Calgary Herald about returning to Alberta for Hell on Wheels’ final ride.

Q: The production built an amazing little town to represent Cheyenne for Season 4 on the Albertina Farms. Are you moving it or does it not factor into the story this season?

A: It’s not a part of the story. I believe the town is still standing, I think the folks that own the Albertina Farms are going to use it as a film location, but we are not using it. It’s an awesome western town, maybe one of the best western towns I’ve seen. There aren’t a lot of them anymore. It’s completely practical. All of those buildings you can shoot in. Unfortunately, and this is part of the challenge of making Hell on Wheels, if you’re following the story you know it moves by a mile to three miles, sometimes up to five miles a day west. You just don’t stay in the same place.

Q: Historically there is a natural ending to the story of the first transcontinental railroad: pounding the golden spike at Promontory connecting the Central and Union Pacific. Is this going to play into the series finale as well?

A: We are going to play to that. I can’t guarantee you that the very end of the series will be that image, but that image will be in the show this season.

Q: How difficult is it to wrap up a series after five years?

A: It’s a challenge to end a story in a satisfying way. We’ve seen it done on television quite a bit. There are a few notable endings in the last few years. Lost had a very notable ending. As I think about that Sopranos ending now, it’s really beautiful and elegant and I love it. I think the Breaking Bad ending was really awesome. Mad Men is on its way to what I’m sure will be a really wonderful ending. It takes a lot of thought. You have to try to end the story in the right way and then you have to end the story for each of your characters in the right way. Then there’s the bittersweet aspect of it that clouds everything. Everyone is aware that this is it. After five years, there gets to be a routine in one’s life: You know when you will be in Calgary, you know when you will be shooting, you know when the writers’ room starts. The thought that it won’t be continuing and the family we created over the last five years will be disbanding and going on their way, there is a bittersweet aspect to it for sure. I would say that the umbrella over all of that is the enormous pride that we have in this show. It’s really a thing that gets under your skin. Every single person who works on it feels that way and we’re enjoying every moment of it now.

Q: Season 4 saw some great new characters — Jake Weber as carpetbagger John Campbell and Jonathan Scarfe as former Confederate soldier Sydney Snow. Will there be new faces in Season 5?

A: We have three new major characters. They are primarily coming into the story on the Central Pacific side of the story. There are two sides of the railroad and we’ve spent the last four years exploring exclusively the Union Pacific side of the railroad. We have some Chinese characters and that is what is new this season. There were 15,000 Chinese workers working for the Central Pacific railroad. There were no Chinese labourers on the Union Pacific side of the railroad. But they were primarily responsible for building the California side. So we are going to meet three guys that represent three different type of characters that you would find in Chinese workforce.

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